MicroPasts Knowledge Exchanges

MicroPasts
Knowledge Exchanges follows from the original MicroPasts project which
was funded under the AHRC
call for Digital Transformations in Community Research Co-Production in the
Arts and Humanities for an initial period of 18 months (1 October 2013 to 31
March 2015). During this time, the MicroPasts team developed, implemented and
started to evaluate a novel model to support collaborative research in
archaeology, history and heritage that draws on crowd-sourcing, co-design and crowd-funding.

Building
on these results, the new AHRC Follow-on project will enable a programme of
knowledge exchange and further evaluation with two linked aims:

To
study and implement a community-led model of platform and project management
that is sustainable in the longer-term.

To
inform heritage policy and practice in the UK, and guide private and public investments
in participatory projects that use crowd-sourcing and/or crowd-funding.

Research Objectives

With interested MicroPasts contributors, to discuss
and define the specific ways in which they would be willing to take
responsibility for the day-to-day running of the MicroPasts websites, the
development and maintenance of collaborations with partnering institutions (in
higher education, but also Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums - GLAM)
and the coordination of the MicroPasts volunteer and donor groups.

Together with interested MicroPasts contributors,
to develop the technical resources, guidelines and skills that are necessary
for a community-led model of platform and project management to become fully
operational.

With policy-makers, analysts and practitioners in
the heritage sector, to review and discuss the methods and results of the
evaluation conducted in the lifetime of MicroPasts.

Together with policy-makers, analysts and
practitioners in the heritage sector, to develop knowledge on the benefits
generated by the use of crowd-sourcing and crowd-funding, for individuals,
communities and heritage, and on the best methods to capture them.